GOP: Pope’s no liberal

Some Republicans hope Francis sets the record straight when he and Obama meet. | AP Photo

Father John Putka, a retired political science professor and personal friend of Speaker John Boehner’s for more than 30 years, said that’s enough to give a reality check to Democrats who think they’ve found a new partner: “The fact that the U.S. bishops are suing the administration, obviously they’re not in line with the pope on these issues.”

But now Francis is emphasizing new priorities — like poverty. And the result is that Republicans can’t say that either.

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“He’s not changing anything but is mixing up this claim that the Republican Party is the party of the pope,” said Miller. “He makes it impossible for them to say that.”

Both Sisters Mary Ann Walsh of USCCB and Simone Campbell, head of the Catholic Social Justice Lobby Network, say there’s no questioning the church stance on things like minimum wage hikes and extending unemployment insurance — two things U.S. bishops have been advocating for recently.

USCCB also has “been pushing for decades on universal health care … probably since World War II,” said Walsh — though the narrative has focused on the bishops’ opposition to abortion coverage and the contraceptive mandate.

She is one person who doesn’t see the media as biased in their coverage: “I don’t think he’s been misportrayed. He’s very popular, and it resonates with people. … Everyone wants to be quoted, saying, ‘See! Me and the pope, we agree!”

Republicans who try to wish-wash over these positions are “either delusional or spinning,” said Father Thomas Reese, senior analyst at the National Catholic Reporter.

Call it Catholic guilt or just plain common sense, but Chad Pecknold, theology professor at Catholic University, said there’s a reason you don’t see many politicians openly criticizing the pope — probably the same reason why they prefer to take their frustration out on the media instead.

“Every well-formed Catholic will know that they should follow the pope in terms of faith and morals. The question becomes: At what point are Catholics free to disagree on prudential judgments?” he asked.

It’s one of the reason Americans don’t see Vice President Joe Biden and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), both Catholic, pushing for the church to change its anti-abortion stance.

In a statement for this story, Boehner, another high-profile Catholic, said the “pope doesn’t endorse politicians or their agendas; he speaks of truths and challenges everyone of every ideology to live their lives in a way that reflects those truths.”

Boehner has invited the pope to speak to Congress.

Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.) said something similar: “There’s enough to pick and choose to say he’s on our side or their side, but it trivializes what the pope stands for.”

That won’t stop politicians from doing it anyway.

When the pope famously said, “Who am I to judge,” in response to a question about homosexuality last year, newspapers around the world said he was taking steps toward gay marriage.

Not really. In fact, Francis is known in Argentina, his home country, for his tooth-and-nail fight against gay marriage.

Peter King says the pope’s abortion comments last year were similarly mistaken: “Francis says we shouldn’t be ‘obsessed’ with abortion, and somehow commentators take that of him being pro-choice.”

One anti-abortion group even thanked the pope on its Facebook page.

When Obama met Pope Benedict in 2009, the pope boldly handed him a copy of the church bioethics paper against stem cell research, cloning and in-vitro fertilization.